Sunday, March 22, 2009

Eating My Words with Relish


I have accumulated a long list of accomplishments in my life. Not a list filled with amazing feats. There are no mountain summits that I have conquered. My list is filled with the normal adult milestones: career, marriage, kids and the like, and is peppered with a few impressive feats, relatively speaking. My list probably looks a lot like yours and most of the people you know. What is remarkable about my list is the number of items on it that were previously on my other list - my "To Never Do" list. I didn't even know I had a list like this. But as I thought about some of the wonderful things in my life, my husband, my kids, my situation, and pondered how I actually got to this point, a recurring soundbite kept surfacing. "I will never...insert just about anything."
This apparently was my mantra for a period of time. I said it frequently. I said it about a lot of things. Those of you who have known me for any length of time probably heard me say it. You might even hear me say it again (I will, as they say, never say never again).

Why was I so sure of what I would not do only to walk right up and sign up for those personal taboos, one right after another? My answer: I clearly had no idea what I was talking about. Put them all in the category of NEI (Not Enough Information). The hubris of youth had the better of me. How do I know that my negative proclamations were uninformed and naive? Simply, I have no regrets about failing to maintain the Never List items. I am so happy I dated him again; how else would we have married and created these two wonderful boys? How else would I have the ability to channel my mother's and her mother's words of wisdom that somehow spew out of me without my conscious approval? How else would all of this be happening if my path had not been diverted, refined even, by my failure to remain the same? Thank God things change.

6 comments:

  1. You and me both are thanking God! I am suprised that I merely survived my Never Do list! You cup runith over with insight and wisdom.

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  3. I just got the "relish" part...so perfect!

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  4. I'm pretty sure only people without children say they will 'never' do something : )

    Glad you changed your mind about lots of things!

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  5. Hey you forgot number five,six,etc. You swore you would never drive a minivan..... be on the PTO....the list goes on and on.

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  6. Interesting approach to making lists!

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Whaddaya think about that?